I am the youngest child of Reginald Wickham. My brother Reggie and I have watched our father go to the highest heights with his love of photograph. We both loved watching him work and create art, and have even participated in his artwork as models! (some are for sale in this virtual gallery).
My Dad taught us to be kind, work hard and strive to be the best. In an article written by Celeste Whittaker for the Courier Post in New Jersey, in 2015, Ms. Whittaker for captured my father by him saying “I’ve never worked a day in my life because I’m doing what I love. It’s a passion.” Daddy goes on to say, “I’m not preaching photography, I’m preaching life.” Daddy always told us that if we want to be a plumber, an electrician, garbage collector, dancer, actress or whatever, to be the best at it. “The rest is easy.”
Reginald Wickham was the most humble, unassuming person you would ever have met. He was very serious, had a dry humor but loved life itself. He loved telling you about how he got started in photography and how he did a picture and what details he used.
Daddy loved new experiences and new things. He was always ready for a new challenge, whether it was perfecting the digital world of photography, stain glass, tissue paper art, or oil painting. He was always up for the challenge.
Some of the pictures became “a part of the family” As Celeste Whittaker from the Courier Post in New Jersey reported my father saying that “once doing a show at Penn Station, in New York, a representative from Kodak walked by and noticed a photo of a little African American girl in Harlem. The child was peeking around a corner and Wickham captured it beautifully. His wife, Eleanor named the photo “Peek-a-Boo.” Kodak ended up buying the rights to the photo for seven years and used it in a national advertisement.”
Many times I would come home from dance class to find people like Bob McGrath from Sesame Street, Mercer Ellington, the Duke’s son, singing group Black Ivory, or the President of Perception Records sitting at the kitchen table chatting after a photo session. When they came to our home in Teaneck, New Jersey, they became a part of the family, not celebrities.
I do hope that you enjoy experiencing the artwork journey and purchase your photographic treasure. I do hope you feel the love that went into each piece of artwork. Know that each time you look, a piece of my Father’s heart is looking back.